The Weary Recitation of Bad Analogies

Richard Cohen reminds us that his references to interventions in the Balkans are completely unreliable:

The more apt comparison is the 78-day NATO bombing campaign in 1995 that ended the bloodshed in Bosnia — and cost not a single American life.

I’m not sure why someone so predisposed to military interventionism and endless Balkan references as Cohen is can’t get basic facts about the Balkan interventions right. The 78-day bombing campaign was in 1999 in Kosovo, and NATO intervention in Bosnia was a much more complicated and prolonged affair than Cohen describes. If Cohen can’t even be bothered to get simple details about past interventions right, it’s safe to say that there’s not much reason to trust his judgment about new ones. The truth is that Cohen cites the Balkan interventions because these are accepted as “good” interventions that “worked,” and they are the only recent examples an American liberal interventionist has available to him to support an argument for yet another unnecessary war. Syria doesn’t have much in common with the interventions in Bosnia or Kosovo, but Cohen keeps insisting that it does because these are the only examples that even remotely support the idea that the U.S. can successfully intervene in foreign conflicts where it has nothing at stake.

It is somewhat fruitless to compare Syria to other conflicts in order to support or oppose intervention, but one thing that we do know with some certainty is that it does not compare very well with Bosnia or Kosovo. In the Bosnian case, Serb forces were beaten on the ground by Croatian and Bosnian offensives that did most of the work that Cohen wrongly ascribes to NATO action. Nothing of the sort is available in the Syrian case, and Cohen would be the first to reject the idea that he’s proposing a ground war. In the Kosovo case, NATO sought a fairly limited goal of removing Serb forces from one part of the country rather than overthrowing the government and installing rebel forces in its place. In 1999, Russia was ultimately cooperative in getting Milosevic to yield, and even assuming that it had the means to do so Moscow is anything but cooperative in getting Assad to do the same. Serbia was mostly isolated and the closest thing to a patron that it had was weak and in no position to provide much support, but Syria is not so isolated nor lacking in patronage. In short, what “worked” in the Balkans in ’90s isn’t likely to “work” today in Syria, and it’s silly to keep pretending that it would.

Cohen ends on the most bizarre note of all:

The weary recitation of all these ethnicities suggests a colonial-era mentality: those bloody people and their bloody behavior.

If one wanted to fling accusations of having a “colonial-era mentality,” it might be better-suited to someone who seems to think that all that is needed to resolve complex foreign conflicts is for Western military forces to drop a few bombs and tell the locals to get in line. What Cohen calls the “weary recitation of all these ethnicities” is what others might describe as trying to gain a minimal understanding of the country in question. Cohen might remember that having some grasp of sectarian and ethnic differences is valuable when proposing to overthrow a foreign government in a multi-ethnic, religiously diverse country. The point here isn’t that “Syria is Iraq,” but that so many Iraq hawks remain oblivious to these realities of the societies that they so arrogantly assume that the U.S. can and should reorder.

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20 Responses to The Weary Recitation of Bad Analogies

What perplexes me is that conservatives who would have fits at the suggestion that the federal government can order things efficiently within the borders of the United States maintain that that same federal government can order things to its entire satisfaction in foreign countries. Make no sense.

“Serb forces were beaten on the ground by Croatian and Bosnian offensives that did most of the work that Cohen wrongly ascribes to NATO action. Nothing of the sort is available in the Syrian case”
If the Syrian anti-government forces are so weak, how were they able to capture and hold territory from a brutal regime for the last two years?

“It is somewhat fruitless to compare Syria to other conflicts in order to support or oppose intervention,”
Seems to me that most of the opposition is based precisely on analogies with other conflicts that purportedly show the failure of US interventionism. You yourself have invoked Libya a number of times. And I still don’t understand how on Earth our Libya actions were a failure.

I also can’t discern what your thinking is toward the Bosnian and Kosovo interventions. Are you perhaps afraid to say that there are times when intervention is warranted, even when it’s only a peripheral interest? Would you have opposed the aid Americans gave to Great Britain in the run-up to WW2? Do you have any practical opinions on pre-war American isolationism?

Much of the skepticism on this site is completely warranted, an example of vigilance against our government. But our government, compromised as it may be, as every massive bureaucratic organization is bound to be, is still also composed of people. Not every American policy is a hidden imperialist agenda. Sometimes people (in and out of government) are genuinely outraged, and want to help people in distress, and not to the point that it bankrupts us, but to the point where it satisfies some sense of human decency. The US probably could not risk militarily helping the Hungarians in 56 or the Czechs in 68. But it did help as best as it could, through a great variety of channels, in ways that it deemed appropriate. Many of human attempts fail, or are misguided or compromised by greed and stupidity. But the idea of lightly dismissing a two year long popular revolt by people genuinely oppressed and genuinely desiring something better does not appeal to me, especially if done with the kind of facility and ease with which it labels “interventionist” arguments. People like me are supposedly pink-cloud idealists, who have no idea of the rough ways of the world and how everything is hijacked by the military industrial complex. But yours is the reverse side of the coin. Many people posting here respond to me with what is essentially “Am I my brother’s keeper?” As if that was an argument that could be taken seriously. And people who argue that something more should be done to help those Syrians who have been hanging on for two years are treated like fools. Well, I wish it was that easy to dismiss a good argument. I’m giving you guys your due: I applaud your skepticism. But the lighthearted manner in which this serious issue–how to help people in genuine distress who are clearly clawing to get out of it–is treated, and how “interventionists” are labeled and brushed back and summarily dismissed is really unworthy of intelligent discussion.

The problem is that you seem intent on romanticizing the events in Syria as a heroic uprising, instead of the brutal, sectarian civil war it actually is. Now, your side has to make the case, that it is worth getting ourselves in the middle of such a civil war; doing so even though we have no real national interests at stake.

All people everywhere generally desire something better. I am sure many people who fought for the Bolsheviks also desired something better. Alas, simply having the desire for something better is irrelevant when your political movement is dominated by radical islamists.

Also, there are simply some people who don’t view the proper role of the US as a worldwide revolutionary force for freedom/human rights. The founding fathers happened to agree.

True, good arguments aren’t easy to dismiss. The ones that we keep hearing, however, are the same lazy posturing and hyperventilating that always arise when there is some fight somewhere that the US has somehow yet to involve itself in. Yet the arguments continue, year after year, to delude too many of us into thinking that this distant conflict is somehow not like all the others. It is really up to those who wish to intervene — if only there were a handy descriptor for them, say, “intervenophiles”? — to come up with better arguments, rather than stamping their foot and demanding a more respectful hearing.

Orwell was right – debased language really does corrupt thought. So we find people who try to understand the complexities of other countries before intervening in them denounced as colonialists and those who eschew violence as our primary means of engaging with other countries belittled as isolationists. Emilio seems very sincere but exemplifies another strand of this sort of thinking, in which concern about ordinary people caught up in a civil war “(“something more should be done”) has to be expressed by dropping bombs on their country in order to be truly meaningful. What we’re talking about in Syria is involving ourselves in a violent conflict, ie killing people or helping others kill them. I don’t think it’s wrong, morally or otherwise, to ask what the killing is meant to accomplish and how it’s going to accomplish that before doing it. I can understand being upset about human suffering, but I don’t agree with debasing language in order to talk about it.

Intervention in the Syrian civil war means choosing a side and killing or helping to kill members of the other side until our chosen side governs Syria. If we are truly decent human beings, then we owe a commitment to our citizens involved in realizing such a policy; namely, that (a) it is important enough to the American polity that we will not simply leave when the inevitable casualties occur, and (b) the people we empower will not govern in a manner abhorrent to us.

In Libya, the President directed only such help as we could give without serious risk of casualties, satisfying condition (a). On the other hand, the central government is so weak that it has no choice but to defer to sectarian militias (the “brigades”) throughout much of the country, and these militias also kidnap and murder people (perhaps using our weapons and ammunition) thought to be associated with the old regime without any repercussions from the central government whatsoever. It’s not unexpected, but if one is looking for a more capable and moral successor to Gaddafi in Libyan government, he might take a while to find. Perhaps chaos in Libya serves our interests, as chaos in Syria has been alleged to serve our interests, but is it sensible to risk American lives to stimulate chaos in already chaotic countries where we are unlikely to find allies that don’t embarrass us?

Seems people forget that the when the Clinton White House learned that Iran was sending weaponry to Bosnian Muslims in the mid-90’s, they chose to do nothing.

A few years later, when Israel objected to American air-strikes in Kosovo, Clinton politely told the Israelis to STFU. Israel did not like the precedent of an outside power coming in to settle disputes between a national government and a disgruntled/abused minority group. I wonder why?

You start referring to past foreign policy “successes”, you are liable to get these inconvenient facts mentioned.

Cohen is a moron, and you do well to point out his errors and idiocies. But, as I noted in my reply to your comment below (on capitulation), there is one thread that connects Syria, Libya, Kosovo and, perhaps, Bosnia, and it is this: initial US reluctance (for principled and practical reasons) yields, if you will, to ally pressure. Bosnia is the most glaring example of the US staying out of the scene for years (Somalia left a bad taste in Clinton’s mouth; and the US considered Bosnia to be Europe’s problem), and being able to broker a piece, back by threat of war, to put an end to a civil war that had claimed upwards of 200,000 lives. On Kosovo, let us not forget that the US did not initially want to get involved; it was NATO pressure that got the US into the bombing. (Contemporary accounts indicate that the Nordics and Italy, in particular, did not want another Bosnia, but had no means of actually acting on their threats of engagement.) And Libya saw, of course, the US getting involved only after being pushed by Italy, France and the UK.

The announcement on Syria comes a week or two after the EU announced an easing of the arms embargo. I don’t think it was a coincidence. The EU, if left to itself, is likely to make a hash of things (we know this from past experience); it is not unreasonable for the US to try to influence what is likely to be yet another EU-created disaster.

I agree that pressure from certain allies was a significant factor in Bosnia, Kosovo, and Libya. I am less convinced that it was such an important factor here, since the U.S. position is now more aggressive re: arming the opposition than actual British and French policy at the moment. The end to the EU embargo was evidence of the dysfunction of EU foreign policy (UK and France wanted to have the option available, Germany and others are strongly opposed), and not an endorsement of a policy to arm the opposition.

The problem I see here is that our allies are rarely, if ever, unanimous about these issues, and far more NATO allies usually want to stay out of these conflicts than get into them. If the U.S. wanted to listen to major allies that counsel staying out of the conflict (e.g., Germany), it could do so and claim that it was heeding the wishes of our allies, but invariably the U.S. keeps coming down on the side of the European governments that favor more aggressive measures. Sometimes the U.S. does this because it doesn’t want to damage relations with the pro-intervention governments, and sometimes it uses their position as cover for action that would otherwise be harder to sell if done alone. Even if Obama has been yielding to allied pressure to take a more hawkish position, that still shows a pattern of yielding to hawkish demands and escalating involvement in these conflicts. If Turkey, France, and Britain started clamoring for a no-fly zone, wouldn’t Obama feel obliged to agree to it for the reasons you’re describing? And if he did, how would that not be an example of yielding to pressure to escalate?

“If Turkey, France, and Britain started clamoring for a no-fly zone, wouldn’t Obama feel obliged to agree to it for the reasons you’re describing?”

Two points.

First, no amount of clamouring got the US involved in Rwanda – so it is not the case that ally agitation for involvement is always determinative of US involvement. It depends. It is true that the noninterventionist stance of some allies carries less weight than others: Germany, in particular, does not appear to carry a lot of weight because its noninterventionism is seen to be knee-jerk, bounded by history, and generally anti-American, rather than situational. (Not to mention that after the botch the Germans made of the Balkans, no one should be listening to their foreign policy advice in any event.) In Kosovo, the US was persuaded mostly by the Nordics – who are not instinctively noninterventionist, but also do not have the means to intervene – a sort of “honest broker” of intervention, if you will. So who is doing the pushing and why matters.

Second, I suspect the US will resist the clamouring for a no-fly zone (as it did in Libya) until such time as specific means and endpoints are identified, the means achieve the ends and there is a credible withdrawal strategy, and the US is convinced that if the trio go alone, they will botch it.

I don’t doubt that “ally pressure” could act as a foil for the Administration to do what it wants to do. I don’t think it is the case here. I don’t think the EU lifting of the arms embargo was determinative; I think, however, it is more likely that the US limited involvement is motivated by allies and assessment of the facts on the ground than McCain’s warmongering. It is a safe bet that Obama cares not one iota for the ramblings of the fool. Nor do I think that either Obama or Hillary wants to see 2016 come with the US in a third war – this, of Obama’s making.

“Not every American policy is a hidden imperialist agenda. Sometimes people (in and out of government) are genuinely outraged, and want to help people in distress, and not to the point that it bankrupts us, but to the point where it satisfies some sense of human decency.”

Intent doesn’t count for much. Focusing on probable outcomes is the best one can do.

Messing with the lives of others to satisfy one’s “sense of human decency” is appalling. The idea that intervention will not only result in better outcomes than would occur otherwise but that those outcomes will also reflect human decency assumes omniscience and omnipotence.

What can be known and specifically defined are one’s country’s vital national interests. Any intervention should be based on those alone (not “peripheral interests”) because there is a great deal of certainty associated with them and their vital nature justifies taking the huge risks associated with intervention.

“And I still don’t understand how on Earth our Libya actions were a failure.”

There are many reasons but the most important, imo, is that the U.S. demonstrated to every government that cannot prevent foreign interference with their internal affairs through conventional military means that Qaddafi was a fool for negotiating away his nuclear weapons program and that they definitely need a nuclear deterrent.

Richard Cohen is an ignoramus. If he had an ounce of shame he would have resigned when it became clear that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Unfortunately for some reason, he still has a plum job at one of the most prestigious newspapers in the country.

It seems to me the matter is that those who instinctively favour interventions in such scenarios, or whenever the issue is widely raised as a possibility, view intervention in an inherently positive light. I wouldn’t argue that non-interventionists don’t view them inherently negatively, as I do.

Interventionists admit, for the most part I think, that interventions often go wrong or not as anticipated. But they are exasperated I think when they see non-interventionists opposing an intervention before it has happened, because they only see legitimate judgment after the fact. It may go bad or it might work out, but at least we tried? But to the non-interventionist, “intervention” is mostly euphemistic. Intervention in this context requires force. We will have to kill Syrians, and even if you believe that any Syrian regime fighter or sympathiser, has forfeited their right to life, innocents will die too. Even though war is already happening, and innocents are already dying, this is still an affirmative act on the part of the intervening actor. Intervention is not morally good at inception, a status that may be altered by events on the ground, it is not even morally neutral. Intervention requires blood letting and to support it you must make a very good case that intervention will make up for it, if you think such morality is legitimate. Intervention also violates presumed sovereignty and it’s a very bad thing for powerful countries to dictate when sovereignty is no longer valid. That’s why Daniel is so “dismissive” of the likes of Cohen, who is so eager to go to war but feels no apparent duty to come up with a strong rationale for doing so.